9 then moving to its most recent structure.18 He describes the relationship between the Soviet Union and the other communist nations as unequal, where the smaller nations tend to aid the Soviets.19 Laqueur’s historical approach is different than his methods used to compare the various open societies. The dichotomy in approaches makes it difficult to have a transnational comparison. One example is his description of the Soviet Union’s intelligence structure – he focuses more on the weaknesses in their operations, rather than comparing different agencies to one another.20 While he explains in some length about the relationship between intelligence producers and consumers in open societies, he glazes over the subject when writing about the Soviet system. Instead, his focus remains more on its historical development and current defects.21 Other comparative studies use the Civil-Military Relations (CMR) model to compare intelligence communities. Scholar Robert Jervis says the role of intelligence is the “missing dimension” in international relations and advocates using the CMR model.22 There are some interesting parallels between CMR studies and other studies analyzing relations between civilian authorities and intelligence services. According to Jervis, the general view of intelligence services and militaries is that they “should be strong, efficient, and professionalized, but on the other hand they should not set their own goals and they must respond to civilian authority…We want the military and intelligence to be 18
Ibid, 233-248. Ibid, 249-250. 20 Ibid, 248-252. 21 There are a number of writings on the defects of the Soviet intelligence apparatus and Laqueur’s discussion is not entirely out of context. A more recent writing on this subject comes from Michael Herman in Intelligence Services in the Information Age. Herman discusses the role of the intelligence services in under Stalin and how their assessments were intentionally subjective. This continued after Stalin and exemplifies one difference between western intelligence and non-western intelligence. See Michael Herman, Intelligence Services in the Information Age (Portland, Oregon: Frank Cass Publishers, 2001), 16-19. 22 Robert Jervis, “Intelligence, Civil-Intelligence Relations, and Democracy,” in Reforming Intelligence: Obstacles to Democratic Control and Effectiveness, ed. Thomas Bruneau and Steven Boraz (Austin, Texas: University of Texas Press, 2007), xix. 19